Cautionary Tales: The Vermin
by JudeDeluca
Summary: A retelling of the death of Element Lad's people at the hands of Roxxas the Butcher. A pastor commits mass murder to deal with starving townspeople, vermin in his eyes. But learn how fate deals with vermin and the best way to end its miserable life.


Disclaimer: I do not own Legion.

This is not a happy story. This is a just story. This is about what happens to those who claim to do evil in God's name. You've gotta watch what you say when you work for Hir, Him, Her, or however you call God.

This time, we are focusing on Roxxas the Butcher, the man who murdered Element Lad, Jan Arrah's, people, and turned him into the last Trommite.

The following story is based on a German legend called _The Mouse Tower_ about a cruel bishop who gets punished by God for wiping out the starving inhabitants of a village. I apologize to those of you German readers if I've butchered your legend.

* * *

Cautionary Tales: _The Vermin_

Jan never liked to talk about his frontier hometown. Because all that was left behind was a ghost town. And one single tower left on the outskirts. And here is why…

…

The town of Tremaine, Kansas, had been hit the worst thanks to the Depression. The people were sick. The people were starving. The people were dying. But not Pastor Rogers, oh heavens no. The so-called "Man of God" lived quiet comfortably in his home. Plenty to eat, plenty to drink. Never needed anything. Because he squeezed every last penny out of the good, god-fearing people of Tremaine down to their every last dollar. He bought their land when he had his "men" kill the owners crops and steal their livestock, what little there was to steal, and sold it off. Then, he let the people who used to own the land rent it for outrageous prices. He was no more a man of God than he was a dictator.

Jan, he had been lucky. His parents had sent him to live with relatives in New York. The boy deserved better than what he got in Tremaine. But he wished, oh, how he wished he could be back home. But his parents would not allow it. They did not want their son to become a farmer. They wanted him to become better than that. It was this that spared Jan's life.

Every day, people would beg at his heels for food. For water. He looked on them in disgust. Sodomites. He watched from his high windows as they wandered, fighting one another for food like the #!gge%$ this country once enslaved. No, the good pastor would not part with any of the fine morsels of food he had locked away. No matter how much they begged. Pleaded. A crust. A peel. A handful. A drop.

"No. No, I believe it is high time I take care of this problem." The Pastor said to his men.

"What are you going to do?" One asked.

"God's work."

And so, one day in June, he gathered the people in front of the steeple, and announced to them.

"To all you poor and tired, starving masses. Do you hunger?"

"Yes!" They cried.

"Do you thirst?"

"Yes!"

"Then all those before the eyes of God, I shall feed thee and quench thy thirst, as it says in the good book. Tonight, your suffering shall end."

And the people praised the Pastor Rogers as his men watched him do "God's work".

…

It was later that night, at dusk, actually, when the people had been gathered back to the steeple. The town of Tremaine had not seen such an event in a long time. Mouths watering and bellies grumbling, the people did not mind when the pastor's men forced them. Even those who had denounced Pastor Rogers in the past, they didn't care. They were just too hungry. They saw tables and empty plates spread around.

"When are we going to be fed?" A woman holding her newborn asked.

"Soon."

It wasn't till long that all of Pastor Rogers' men were outside, along with him. He stood behind the scenes.

"Is that everyone?" The Pastor asked, standing outside the steeple. It was packed to the bursting.

"That's everyone, Pastor." One man said.

"Good." The Pastor smiled. Then, he scowled. "Lock it down."

The people from inside started to worry when they realized the doors had been locked from the outside. Then, someone said…

"What's that smell?"

It wasn't long before the screams shattered the night from the fire the Pastor's men had started. People tried to crawl out through the windows, pawing their way through the stained glass, but their attempts were made futile by the steel bars in the framing. There were the shrieks and howls of young and old, men and women. And children. The smell of burning wood and boiling flesh flooded the scene. One of the pastor's men vomited from the stench. Black smoke piled high, clogging the sky.

"Such a wonderful bonfire!" Rogers said. "Listen! Listen to the mice squeaking!"

The screams grew louder as more and more were eaten by the fire.

"Oh yes, I am doing God's work." Rogers smiled to himself. "Who else does he have to thank for getting rid of such vermin?"

Finally, the roof caved in, and the last cries were put out. All that was left was the sound of wood burning. It wasn't till an hour later that the building had finally been brought down. A blackened rib cage, left cracked open, that was the best way to describe the remains of the steeple. The Pastor's men walked through the remains, ash on their boots and wood crunching beneath their feet. Nothing but ash.

"That's it!" One of them said. "All gone!"

"Good. Now I might finally enjoy a meal without worrying about the rodents." The Pastor said to himself as he left for his dinner.

The last meal God would let him enjoy.

…

"Pastor! Pastor!"

The Pastor squirmed in his bed in the early morning. He lifted his head from the pillows and snarled.

"What is it?!" He yelled. And then. He heard it. "What's that sound?"

SQUEESQUEESQUEESQUEE.

"Rats! Mice! They're eatin' everything!" One of his men told him.

"What?!" Rogers screamed as he jumped out of bed, and yelled when he felt a furry body beneath his feet squeal.

Throughout his great home, there were mice everywhere. Chewing through everything. Hungering for everything.

"Get off! Get away!" Rogers screamed as he swatted away a brown rat that was chewing an expensive painting of himself, hanging above his fireplace. But, when one was gone, ten replaced it.

"They're everywhere, sir!"

"I can see tha-"

"AAAAAAHHHHH!!!"

Outside his window, the Pastor saw the gardens infested with rats and in everything else. And there was a mound of them that was screaming in agony. Finally, the mound dispersed, and they left behind a clean white set of bones.

"Dear God." Rogers whispered.

"AAAHH!!"

Rogers turned white as he saw a fat, black field mouse jump off a curtain and land square on the face of the man next to him.

Blood squirted into Rogers' face as the mouse chewed through the man's eye no matter how hard he tried to get it off. The rat ate it's way through the man's eye socket and crawled in. The man slumped down and twitched and jerked as more followed it's brother until they were squirming inside him, their mousey bodies running around underneath his flesh.

"Sir! There's more comin'!" Another of his subordinates said.

"What?!" Rogers said.

"From the town! Waves of them!"

Rogers did not say a word, he only ran. Fear for his life took over his fear of losing his possessions as ran to the stables and jumped on one of his horses and rode off. There was one place he thought of that was safe from the rats.

Beyond the river of Tremaine, there stood the old church. The people stopped using it once they built the steeple. And they also stopped using the stone bell tower. He would be safe in.

As Rogers galloped past on his steed, the twitching and gnawing of ratty teeth behind him. Hundreds, thousands, they were hungry. And they wanted him.

His horse galloped through the dry and cracked bed of Tremaine's river, until it reached the old bell tower. He hopped off the horse, he could care less about it, and ran in. He sealed the heavy iron doors behind him, and listened to the muffled cries of his horse as the rodents devoured it. And then. Nothing.

Silence.

"Thank God." The good pastor sighed to himself in the silence.

PLOP.

"Huh?"

PLOP. PLOP.

"No." He whispred.

PLOP PLOP PLOP.

"No!"

PLOPPLOPPLOPLSQUEESQUEESQUEEEEEEEEEE

"NOOOOOOOO!!!"

The Pastor screamed as the mice forced themselves in the miniscule cracks in the stone. As they climbed up the outside and jumped in from the top of the tower. As the burrowed in from underneath.

"Get away! Get away!" Rogers screamed and kicked, but it was no use. They jumped and latched onto him. Bit his flesh. Chewed and nibbled. Whetted their teeth against his bones. The pain of being eaten alive.

"WWWWHHHHHHYYYYY????!!!!!!!!!"

He screamed in his living death. He gargled as they bit into his throat. Pulled out his vocal chords. One hand was clawing out from the mound that surrounded him.

They ate until their bellies were full. Until their thirst was quenched. And then, they were gone. For, you see, the vermin had been exterminated.

…

News of the fire had spread, and Jan went into such mourning. He traveled a week after the incident, to see what had happened. To see where his parents had died. And where God had punished their murdered. A month later, he would leave for New York to pursue college.

All that was left behind to remember what happened was a marker, on the door of the tower. A poem.

_They whetted their teeth against the stones,  
and then they picked the pastor's bones;  
They gnawed the flesh of every limb,  
for they were sent to punish him._

_The End._


End file.
